The fiery furge, that from the precipice
Of Heav'n receiv'd us falling; and the thunder,
Wing'd with red lightning and impetuous rage,
Perhaps hath spent his shafts, and ceases now
To bellow through the vast and boundless deep.
Let us not flip th' occafion, whether scorn,
Or fatiate fury yield it from our foe.
Seeft thou yon dreary plain, forlorn and wild,
The feat of defolation, void of light,
Save what the glimmering of thefe livid flames
Cafts pale and dreadful? Thither let us tend
From off the toffing of these fiery waves,
There rest, if any rest can harbour there,
And re-affembling our afflicted Powers,
Confult how we may henceforth most offend
Our enemy, our own lofs how repair,
How overcome this dire calamity,
What reinforcement we may gain from hope,
If not what refolution from despair.
Thus Satan talking to his nearest mate
With head up-lift above the wave, and eyes
That sparkling blaz'd, his other parts besides
Prone on the flood, extended long and large
Lay floting many a rood, in bulk as huge
As whom the fables name of monftrous fize,
Titanian, or Earth-born, that warr'd on Jove,
Briareos or Typhon, whom the den
By ancient Tarfus held, or that fea-beast
Leviathan, which God of all his works.
Created hugeft that swim th' ocean stream:
Him haply flumb'ring on the Norway foam
The pilot of fome small night-founder'd skiff
Deeming fome iland, oft, as fea-men tell,
With fixed anchor in his skaly rind
Moors by his fide under the lee, while night
Invests the fea, and wished morn delays:
So ftretch'd out huge in length the Arch-Fiend lay
Chain'd on the burning lake, nor ever thence
Had ris'n or heav'd his head, but that the will
And high permiffion of all-ruling Heaven
Left him at large to his own dark designs,
That with reiterated crimes he might
Heap on himself damnation, while he fought
Evil to others, and enrag'd might fee
How all his malice ferv'd but to bring forth
Infinite goodness, grace and mercy fhown
On Man by him feduc'd, but on himself
Treble confufion, wrath and vengeance pour'd.
Forthwith upright he rears from off the pool
His mighty ftature; on each hand the flames
Driv'n backward flope their pointing spires, and roll'd
In billows, leave i'th' midst a horrid vale.
Then with expanded wings he steers his flight
Aloft, incumbent on the dusky air
That felt unusual weight, till on dry land
He lights, if it were land that ever burn'd
With folid, as the lake with liquid fire;
And fuch appear'd in hue, as when the force
Of fubterranean wind transports a hill
Torn from Pelorus, or the shatter'd fide
Of thund'ring Ætna, whose combustible
And fuel'd entrails thence conceiving fire,
Sublim'd with mineral fury, aid the winds,
And leave a finged bottom all involv'd
With french and smoke: Such refting found the fole
Of unbleft feet. Him follow'd his next mate,
Both glorying to have 'fcap'd the Stygian flood
As Gods, and by their own recover'd strength,
Not by the fufferance of fupernal Power.
Is this the region, this the foil, the clime, Said then the loft Arch-Angel, this the feat That we must change for Heav'n, this mournful gloom For that celestial light? Be' it fo, fince he
Who now is Sovran can dispose and bid
What fhall be right: fartheft from him is beft,
Whom reas'on hath equal'd, force hath made fupreme
Above his equals. Farewell happy fields,
Where joy for ever dwells: Hail horrors, hail
Infernal world, and thou profoundest Hell
Receive thy new poffeffor; one who brings
A mind not to be chang'd by place or time.
The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heaven.
What matter where, if I be ftill the fame,
And what I should be, all but lefs than he
Whom thunder hath made greater? Here at leaft
We shall be free; th' Almighty hath not built
Here for his envy, will not drive us hence:
Here we may reign secure, and in my choice
To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than ferve in Heaven.
But wherefore let we then our faithful friends,
Th' affociates and copartners of our loss,
Lie thus aftonish'd on th' oblivious pool,
And call them not to fhare with us their part
In this unhappy manfion, or once more
With rallied arms to try what may be yet
Regain'd in Heav'n, or what more loft in Hell?
So Satan fpake, and him Beëlzebub
Thus anfwer'd. Leader of thofe armies bright,
Which but th' Omnipotent none could have foil'd,
If once they hear that voice, their livelieft pledge
Of hope in fears and dangers, heard so oft
In worst extremes, and on the perilous edge
Of battel when it rag'd, in all assaults
Their fureft fignal, they will foon resume
New courage and revive, though now they lie
Groveling and proftrate on yon lake of fire,
As we ere while, astounded and amaz'd,
No wonder, fall'n fuch a pernicious highth.
He scarce had ceas'd when the superior Fiend
Was moving tow'ard the shore; his pond'rous fhield,
Ethereal temper, maffy, large and round,
Behind him caft; the broad circumference
Hung on his shoulders like the moon, whose orb
Through optic glass the Tuscan artist views
At evening from the top of Fefolé,
Or in Valdarno, to descry new lands,
Rivers or mountains in her fpotty globe.
His fpear, to equal which the tallest pine
Hewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mast
Of some great ammiral, were but a wand,
He walk'd with to fupport uneafy steps
Over the burning marle, not like those steps
On Heaven's azure, and the torrid clime
Smote on him fore befides, vaulted with fire:
Nathlefs he fo indur'd, till on the beach
Of that inflamed fea he stood, and call'd
His legions, Angel forms, who lay intranc'd
Thick as autumnal leaves that ftrow the brooks
In Vallombrofa, where th' Etrurian fhades
High over-arch'd imbow'r; or scatter'd sedge
Aflote, when with fierce winds Orion arm'd
Hath vex'd the Red-Sea coast, whose waves o'erthrew
Bufiris and his Memphian chivalry,
While with perfidious hatred they pursued
The fojourners of Gofhen, who beheld
From the fafe fhore their floting carcafes
And broken chariot wheels: fo thick beftrown
Abject and loft lay thefe, covering the flood,
Under amazement of their hideous change.
He call'd fo loud, that all the hollow deep
Of Hell refounded. Princes, Potentates,
Warriors, the flow'r of Heav'n, once your's, now loft,
If fuch astonishment as this can feife
Eternal Spirits; or have ye chos'n this place
After the toil of battel to repofe
Your wearied virtue, for the eafe you find
To flumber here, as in the vales of Heaven?
Or in this abject pofture have ye fworn
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